Journey Home - 2018-10-01 - Dr. Paul Thigpen

[Music] [Music] good evening and welcome to the journey home I'm Marcus Grodi your host for this program I have this privilege again you know I could sit down and listen to someone talk about how the holy spirit touched his heart open him to a deeper walk with Jesus Christ in his church and I'm excited and privileged to have as a guest tonight not only a former journey home guest that's been on here almost more times than I have but but a good friend dr. Paul Thigpen good to have you back oh thank you and former evangelical Pentecostal minister and you told me some just a second ago just before we went on that I've been asked asking you if you've been writing lately and what you just finished your 50th book that's all right got a couple more on the horizon - that's great that it really is good in fact one of the reasons that I asked Paul to come back at this time is Paul's a prolific writer and has written on many issues about our faith and I don't think any of us watching this program whether you're watching it now when it's first aired or whether in the future is oblivious to the fact that the church right now is going through a difficult time we can't avoid that there's a scandal and for many of us it's disheartening to say the least disgusting some might say discouraging especially as I am the parent of a of a seminarian so anyway I don't need to go in detail all the stuff that we've it sits there on the Internet it's everywhere but I I wanted to invite some guests back to the journey home that could address not the issues as if we're a news report because we aren't this program is about conversion it's about a deeper walk with Jesus Christ drawn to his church and looking at life through the eye of the church which is what we believe is why we're Catholics is that our Lord established this church and so when we see problems in the church one of the questions is how do we respond how do we respond to that in terms of conversion how do we talk to those outside the church about it how do we talk to those in the church that are deeply deeply deeply hurt and discouraged and want to leave but before we get there some of the audience may not have heard your story so that's what we're gonna get to and partially is because Paul has written three books which we're going to talk about after the break I assume that deal with issues that all are connected to our present struggle all right but before we get there why don't we talk a little bit about your journey you've given the whole thing on on the journey home before but remind the audience in case and I'll shut up well thank you Marcus not I like to tell people I'm a walking ecumenical movement I was born into a family that was Lutheran at the time was not baptized until we belonged to a Presbyterian Church became a atheist it at age 12 for six years all the way through junior high senior high was was an atheist had a dramatic conversion back to the Christian faith when I was 18 and after that then in a series of Evangelical Protestant backgrounds was either a member of or associated with an additional Lutheran's and Presbyterians Baptists Episcopalians Methodist Assemblies of God two different kinds of non-denominational churches and very restless because I hadn't found home yeah and was this why you were studying in school or why you were working that you were visiting all these different churches well I was actually part of it was a it you know youth pastor for okay I just heard from once I was a taught Sunday School in an Episcopal Church we belong to the Methodist Church for a while we belong to the Assemblies of God so actually associated with while you were in ministry yeah yes don't realize and then finally ordained in the church in Atlanta and what I guess began to set me on the road where the Gothic church was when I decided to do a doctoral program in church history historical theology we all know that the V deep in history go what happens and other things were going on I was meeting Catholic folks that were impressing me with their faith and their knowledge and their their depth and I was beginning to as I was reading for instance st. Agustin in my classes I would find myself talking to I would stop and say wait I'm not supposed to be praying to say that's what I'm doing I still remember one day when I was reading st. agustín's essay against the donethis they were the people of their day who kind of had decided the Catholic Church was it pure enough and they broke away they're the one that instead of using a way for youth doughnuts right is that were the name but so I remember reading that and he was talking about all these making all these points about why they shouldn't do that I'm saying yeah you don't bug us - that's right you know you tell him you told this is the fourth century then Osun I put the book down I said oh my goodness I have a doughnut system I'm a 20th century don't for all these reasons they've given for being separated from this church that goes back to the Apostles and that was enlightening and all kinds of it was in that letter to the Donatists that I think that Gus and makes one of the strongest statements which is it doesn't matter how heretic Oh your leaders might get it's never a reason for schism yes yes I think it was something like that yeah instead to the Dunstan and let how bad leadership gets it's never justifies yeah excuse me yeah so that I took a course on the Mystics say Catherine see I began to read the dialogues which also showed me all kinds of things going on at her time the middle agent sent but slowly began to be convinced that this would be home for me because this is the church that Jesus founded the apostles and no matter what might come up would be like Peter saying where else do we have to go over and took my wife wasn't quite at the same place while I had the was spending all my day reading these church fathers especially at others a my program she was taking here the kids at home school and then all these other things and didn't have the leisure but eventually she did come to the same same conviction we came into the church it's been 25 years this year this Easter was our silver anniversary and I always tell people it's the best decision I ever made except for marrying my wife that's the best now I can't remember because you came into your after I did but and we were going through similar things but you were at the first meeting of the coming home network was way back in 93 so you've been associated with our work all along here we've been worked for us for a while and we're on the board for a while and but I'm trying to remember if you were faced with part of that decision about coming into the church what are you gonna do now with your family and whether you're you know supporting your family was that part of the issue for you when you had to jump ship and become Catholic when I began to see the things were headed that way the Lord opened the door for me to to go into the Christian publishing and so because I've been writing and freelance editing things for years so it's not like I got up in my church one day and announced this is gonna happen that way I moved from there and a lot of sadness that had been a wonderful place and I still love those people dearly but I was able to move into a publishing setting now eventually that became complicated because when I went full-time freelance pretty much all but one of my publishers when they found out I was becoming Catholic did not want to use me my services anymore hmm but the Lord made a way and he always says I remember the long story of one of the books that you had published and written and published had been published by a non Catholic publisher and you wanted to get permission to bring that book and update it revise it for a Catholic world and and they wouldn't let go of it right now it's that's another long story but anyway it's uh it was it was complicated I didn't face nearly what many people do when they're making that decision and they know then nothing but pastoral ministry and they won't be able to continue that I did have and because of my doctoral degree was able in their City you'd go into teaching and rents or the theology faculty right you dipped your toe in a lot of different Christian traditions over the years so when you come into the Catholic Church I'm wondering which of the teachings of the church the the thing that the pillars of the church was particularly important to you that draught you end of the church and which of them was maybe that the biggest to get over in becoming Calvin they some of them may have been the same thing so if for instance it of course took me some time to begin to understand Our Lady and because that would be for many folks but once I understood then it became one of the things most attractive most beautiful to me kind of sweetness upset in other settings that that I began to associate with everything that involved her that was a lot like my mother in the same way a very saintly woman but to begin to see her as my mother and she's certainly been one of the bulwarks for me in remain Catholic Sola scriptura that whole issue of trying to understand tradition but once I understood it then it made perfect sense and that's that's became a major part of how I understood God's revelation of himself to us I know a lot of those churches that you mentioned their history is partially driven by almost an anti sacramental commitment that some of these non Catholic Christian traditions have so rejected the idea of sacraments that they're anti sacraments we don't need sacraments the sacraments don't deliver any graces there's nothing special there in Baptism or the Lord's Supper they're just memorials they're just symbols I mean almost vehemently look on sacramental life as a complete work of the devil in the churches so you were in some of those traditions and then you look at the Catholic Church where I mean we don't just say that the sacraments are just one of many ways the church in this age of the church you recognize no the sacraments are the primary way that we receive the graces of Christ talk about that transition for you well it's interesting actually I presented a paper one time when the American Academy of religion which is like the Academy in the academic world for religious scholars on what I call Pentecostals and the sacramental religious imagination and my experience and I've seen it with others is that within the Pentecostal experience which you know has its roots in Scripture they they would see things as grocer and say well that's okay that they are there their way of looking at things that religious matters the deeper you go into the thing else experience the more you begin to your imagination your way of seeing things begins to be more sacramental and so that's why for instance that one of the first things when I began to realize that and I experienced healing miracles saw them that kind of thing and back in the 70s you know when I became Christian the the mainline Protestant churches did not accept that the miracles like Luther's that you have stopped with the early church but and so I was saying but doesn't anybody you know still believe with this initiative Pentecostals not feeling guess what the Catholics are on the same side of that debate as the Pentecostals are and almost nobody was doing exorcisms I thought outside the Pentecostal church and that I realized the Catholic Church was still doing that and it was the Catholic Church that said as Pentecostals did that body postures are important and worship it's not just from the head up and what they what they called pageantry but it's a lot like the Catholic notion of I mean it sessions you know things like vestments I mean some tenet consoles were even use a holy water you know there's something going on here all these things but through my experience as a Pentecostal I've come to see is kind of imitating reflecting echoing things that the Catholics say and do believe which is the Holy Spirit yeah working in the lives of people that are asking God Lord we want you we want to be intimate with you and we did the Lord responds so CS Lewis once said that before his conversion reading George MacDonald had had honey put it baptized his imagination and I like to say that the Pentecostal movement sacramental eyes to my imagination and I began to realize that unlike some of the traditions I've been raised in it said that the body is important that that words can have a certain power that God gives them a divine power postures are important all those things and miracles and and I mean they even have things like relics without realizing it that all those things all right our guest is dr. Paul Thigpen what about another aspect that's radically different in the Catholic Church than almost every other Christian tradition and that's recognizing the importance of sacrifice in worship the in other words the priest is not merely another preacher he is a priest there's a sacrifice and let me talk about history the historical theology of sacrifice in in liturgy that was that something that awakens you to the church well yes reading st. Ignatius of Antioch so who would have been trained by the Apostles almost certainly and to hear him saying what's on the altar it's the very same body they same flesh that was on the cross and I thought oh this is not some later development this man who received his faith from the Apostles is insisting on that and even talks about a few people refused to believe it in left and I'm thinking here again I'm seeing you know history's repeated itself so once once I I came to a conclusion to the conviction that the Eucharist was truly the body and blood of Christ before I ever became Catholic but that it was only that way the Catholic and of course Orthodox setting and once that's really was such an important part of my conversion once I was convinced of that I had to have I had to have the body and blood of Christ and so as a matter of saying Lord how do i how do I get to it now yeah alright you've been a Catholic now for 25 years right and you're celebrating that anniversary as you look back over the years have you learned a few new things as a Catholic that have confirmed your decision that this was indeed the church that God had called you home to well I've seen again and again for instance the the power of confession sacramental confession in the beginning I did it out of obedience the church says we need to do this and I did experience right away you know what great freedom but over the years that awareness that transformation that it brings the power of the grace that it brings has confirmed for me again and again yes yes this this is true my the same of the Eucharist the way it has changed my life trotty I don't make a demands every day but almost interestingly enough you know I've written a book called angle for spiritual warfare and a book about science about Satan some of that recall how in the gospel there were times when say the Sadducees and Pharisees were not believing Jesus that he was who he claimed to be and then the demons in an exorcism when he cast them out would actually be the ones to give testimony that they wouldn't get and say you son of God you know what do you don't come after afters before the day is judgment comes and the more I've learned talking to exercise that others have seen a summer kind of you might say demonic testimony that the demons through what they say testify to the reality of certain Catholic teachings so that for some exorcists one of the the test to give to someone who they think may be possessed to see if they are if there's something spirits are going on or if it's just your mental is to put before them several identical metals holy metals only one of which is blessed and say what do you think of those and speaking through the victim if it is something satanic it'll without the person having natural knowledge point to the ones that aren't blessed and sick just a piece of metal that's nothing that's nothing but them will always point to the one it's blessed and say that burns get it away from me so for people who might think the whole notion of sacramentals and and their being power there ii think that's just all superstition or medieval in some way the demons themselves testify and that's just one example why is it the Satanist when they want to do a black mass they have to have a consecrated host in that obviously that the reality of that steps us back to the reality of ordination of a priest who is the person who therefore is the conveyor of that blessing that to that metal or to our lives or to the congregation or their it's not really nice words that what is a blessing you wrote a book on on a spiritual warfare and then and the importance of that for fighting the spiritual battle what about people watching right now that just wait a second that's just a bunch of words well what's a blessing what goes on in a blessing in a blessing or no object are sometimes some when we speak in sacramentals we usually think of objects like less crucifixes or scapulars or metals but blessing themselves are sacraments and the Rite of exorcism is actually a sacramental how people don't know that so in a sacramental the prayers of the church are associated you might say connected to either the action like blessing over food or to the object in such a way that it they help dispose us to receive the power answer to those prayers and so that's what a blessing is to do to bless and you're literally and from the Latin that benedito so to speak good to speak well and so a blessing is something that if we rightly disposed to to receive it is the the very power of God made possible through the prayers of the church so that metal that's been blessed as a certain aspect of grace exactly it's it's not companying that it's yeah obviously it doesn't convey the grace the way the sacrament does but the way I like to put it as we speak sometimes of an occasion of sin where you come close to the place where sin is likely you know I'd like to speak of them as occasions of grace through the church's prayer the grace is present there now with that sacramental and if you dispose yourself rightly it becomes an occasion of grace for you to receive the grace in response to the prayers of the church what would you argue then that I didn't run this by him before the show so I mean you know putting money you argue then that if a person prays the rosary that there's a certain occasion for grace for someone that prays it with a blessed rosary versus someone that doesn't like me with his fingers he's not running that's a good point so anyone some ways the prayer itself of course has the power as its so there's a difference between that and just having a piece of metal or a piece of metal that has been blessed so that the prayers of the church are associated with it but with a rosary I guess the difference would be that you are actually praying so whether you're doing it with your fingers or and when I'm driving I do the same with my fingers but the the rosary itself the bees that have been blessed yeah they could be hanging in your teenagers room on the wall or by the table and there can actually be an occasional grace it's not magic it's not superstition yeah for those that are outside the Catholic Church that's something so foreign to them that it seems yeah yeah but but never just interesting thing to and view being historical theology how do we gotten so far to the place if for those outside the church something like we're talking about just seems so absolutely foreign to them what happened is it historically that the whole idea of this which as a historic it goes back to the woman with the hemorrhage touching the hem of Jesus garment I mean it goes back to or them touching the garment of Peter or being the shadow I mean that as long as really even old test ones of Elijah the relics the I mean Elijah the relics I think there were two you know some of the things that Martin Luther said in motion were began to desacralized Christian understanding for the folks who followed his direction because you now he's obviously there were problems in the church that he was he was up against and he was becoming disillusioned with it but if you become totally disillusioned then with the the people altogether who who are is using one way or another to bring the grace you can take yourself away from the occasion of grace and I think the Enlightenment you know that actually was kind of an outgrowth of that eventually and in the Enlightenment there was you know resistance to anything that was a mystery anything that was beyond kind of matter and energy that suggested that God has actually involved the life of the world and if there's going to be any religion left after that at all would have to have been something like deism as it was saying there's a god but he's not involved in our lives he just set things in motion and now he there's no miracles there's no sacraments there's no nothing like that as well here we are you know 10 or more generations away from that and of generation after generation we have a whole huge population of non-catholic Christians that the whole idea that objects can be sacraments or sacramentals and and be conveyors of grace and be not only other things that can draw us to God but the very things in baptism and Eucharist that God has given us as the primary channels of grace to unite us to Christ except the Pentecostals Faircloth okay they they did they lay play hands-on they see the body is this yummy all this again that's part of what will wake into my imagination to say how these things real I saw all these things happening so I just want to say to that Chester GK Chesterton what about our favorite writers as you once noted that when when the culture water culture began to throw things out from the Catholic tradition that were imported and needed that it would always smuggle something back into the culture in a lower form so for instance throughout the confessional and eventually had the psychiatrist couch throughout the the commune of saints and then got into seances and channeling and trying to contact the dead and I think you've seen that in the New Age movement especially I mean it started a long time ago but where the wider culture has this sense that yeah there there can be the power of God somehow associate or divine power somehow associated with physical objects or even with certain words that that bear that authority but what they've done is to look in all the wrong places to find that yeah interesting you throw out sacraments and we have you know pervasive drugs there it's something something that'll change my life you know something that'll change my life you know and it's interesting always looking for something that will change their life and it's also interesting given the fact that you know after the break we're going to talk a little bit about what's going on in the church and how to respond to that but since you brought up the Reformation 500 years ago it wasn't the same exact issues that we're facing today but there was great problems in the hierarchy during the late 15th and early 16th century and one of the problems connected with what we're talking about is that as a result it seems to me in your more historic historian than I am but that the the faith of the average Catholic at the time was very external mmm-hmm that you know their faith consisted of the things they did in Mass or going to see relics or going on pilgrimages or buying indulgences whatever it was but maybe because of the average person interviewed it and understand the Latin of what was going on that their faith wasn't as strong their internal conversion in general so what we have in in reaction to this crisis of the time that can trace its roots back to the leadership is that the response of the Reformers was to blame the externals call for the internal conversion faith alone but throw out all the externals in the process and so here we are five years later most of our separate brethren the externals are been important at all there's none of that it's all head up as you're talking about faith is that how you look on that time is that a simplistic way of looking at back at that time or I think that's certainly a you know feature of it you it's so hard for historians to get at the faith of everyday people because they they didn't write and they said read and didn't always leave a lot of evidence for us of how they lived their life and thought and I would think it was probably a widespread problem you know I think there probably were plenty of peasants you know living who really did have this kind of it may not have been a very well-formed faith but a deep faith in God and there was a great interior experience it's when you talk about a whole population right up there with a wide brush exactly well but the parallels to our own time is that people looking and seeing problems in the church and how do you respond to what do you do how do you respond to that so looking back 500 years which was just the 500th anniversary of the Reformation in here we are today with problems in the church how do we respond and maybe that's walk well after the break let's talk about that especially relationship some of the books you've written the ball all right okay [Music] welcome back to journey home I'm your host Marcus Grodi and our guest is dr. paul Thigpen good friend and I told you earlier in the program that we're going to just talk a little bit about the struggles that we're going through right now and the church I'm going to admit that this program is not live tonight we've had had to tape it Bob a month or so before it's broadcast so you know who knows what's going to be happening in this in the time in-between so we can't obviously can't address that but your historian Paul and I what we want to talk about tonight is how do you address a scandal in the church especially when it's our leaders you know so many of us came into the church and one of the main issues was the issue of authority in other words rather than Bible alone and my own interpretation which anyone looking around Chris christened um recognizes that whenever you have a group of Christians that believe all I needs the Bible alone to know what's true is that we're ending up a thousands of conflicting opinions and so those by grace that awake recognize on the one hand that the Bible is the inspired infallible Word of God but yet we need the church established as our guide our drawn home to the church so the issue of authority but it can be troubling then when we come into the church and we see some of our leaders fail in in very disturbing ways and I thought I'm gonna ask you historically to talk about that we're not gonna belittle it at all that's we want to make sure you understand that that's not what we're saying when we talk historically about Scanlan church out or despondent but I want to read an account of somebody talking about scandal in the church from awhile ago and then do you talk about I like putting you on the spot my good friend here's what I read this morning as a part of actually the office of readings of leaders of the hours this morning it was the first reading of liturgy of the hours and it says for Jerusalem has stumbled and Judah has fallen because of their speech and their deeds are against the Lord defying his glorious presence their partiality witnesses against them they proclaimed their sin like Sodom and they do not hide it woe to them for they have brought evil upon themselves tell the righteous that it shall be well with them for they shall eat the fruit of their deeds woe to the wicked it shall be ill with them for what his hands have done shall be done to him my people children are their oppressors and women rule over them all my people your leaders mislead you and confuse the course of your paths that's from the prophet Isaiah as historian paja how did we respond to the scandal into the church well again we don't don't want to minimize it I think about some of the victims that we've been reading about the report from Pennsylvania and I as a parent how can this be so there's there's no way I want to minimize the horror the pain that they have and then it's a my only secondary way the rest of the church looking at that I am in an odd kind of way knowing some church history brings consolation and threatens consolation to find out that if not every year or every century even in the church but then again and again just as it was among the people of God in the Old Testament the New Testament you already start having reports of things by st. Paul and they very early Christians they're going on including sexual immorality looking at things that led up to what are often called the dark ages people often mistake that to mean the entire Middle Ages but just a certain particular period leading up to the end of the first millennium reading the writings of st. Catherine of Siena in which the Lord is speaking to her Jesus is speaking to her we'll call the dialogues and about what's going on behind closed doors among his his clergy again and again to to see that can be a source of great discouragement that does anything ever change on the other hand it can be some kind of consolation and that even even though our situation differs in certain ways from earlier situations the God still was able to have the faith continue have the church itself continue and we have to trust somehow ultimately if not until heaven to bring healing to the ones who have been hurt and so though I think the one thing we have to say is what st. Peter said when things were going rough and he said to Jesus or where would we go Thor says will you leave also and you saw about the Lord personally but it's the same for his church - I think about the Eucharist all the things that we talked about before I haven't the Catholic Church Lord where would I go for all of that even if there's this corruption even if these other things are there what would it have been like I wonder sometimes if you were discipled by the Apostles even but you know before the time of Jesus crucifixion and what if you had first heard about the gospel or about Christ through Judas through his preaching or even through Peter and after those events where he denies the Lord what what might you station have been to say this is a this is all of you know not truth this is all that real and to leave and maybe there's some who did but it's from the very beginning even among our Ward's own apostles and so we have to I think we have to look at that and say it's horrible as it is as horrifying as it is as intense as it is there's certain things that God has given us through this church that we we need depend on and as a people we have to pray we have to make sacrifices we have to purify our own hearts and and all these ways to make sure that at least at our little corner that the faith is is continuing and and that hearts are pure with our children the ones we know people we know what I think about that Isaiah passage which was written a few years ago but it sounds like it's speaking to today I think it does remind you remind us that Biblical prophecy often has an already not yet aspect to it in other words there was an earlier time when our Lord used it in fulfillment but that doesn't necessarily mean it was over that can point to a future time and it could be pointing to today in our lives it could have pointed to a number of times in the church so when we when we hear of that seeming description of our very time does Isaiah also give us instruction on how we ought to respond I was Judah or Jerusalem the Israelites to respond to what they were told about was going to happen in their lives what destructions do we have for that how to respond to skip purify your hearts brings your hearts and nuts or garlic it's always the it's the same message that we hear from Our Lady again and again repent do penance believe again renew your your faith in God your trust in him because I mean look at our Lord's words about the end of the church days about what will happen right before he comes again whether we're in that time now or not we could say but but he talks about things being so bad that if it hadn't been for God's intervention that the very elect could have been the seats and brought away and so that tells us right there that we should not expect that things are going to be all golden you know the danger is that we have bought into a myth and that is the myth of progress as a whole culture and that myth of progress is that the life around us the world that we live in is just gonna keep getting better you might see a blip or a you know a problem here there but that we're gonna live in this great time forever and that even though we might say every Sunday I believe in the second coming when we recite the Creed few of us I can't speak great about myself but live as if well that's way out there way out there we won't say it'll never happen in my lifetime but we live like it but it seems to me that the early church writers all the early church writers the New Testament writers following that the lead of our Lord was calling all of us to live our life as if it could be tomorrow right that's about the thief in the night all of that he was saying the you're not supposed to try and figure out the day but at the same time he's saying but watch and be ready because when you read the signs of the times it part of it is is to remind you there were only pilgrims here yeah right let me talk more about that we're only you've written about that you've written about it and you're your own rendition of going to hell in in your version of Dante you've talked about it in your books on spiritual warfare and you've got your book here the burden which really is a prophetic expression of the time we're in right I mean we were to be ready and watchful like the Old Testament people being ready for when they were going to leave Egypt you know part of the one of the themes we hear again and again from our Lord when he's talking about the really difficult times is do not be deceived and I think that's another part in addition to trying to pure for ourselves that he said we'll say again it don't be deceived don't be misled that's what he says about the elect at the end that they could almost be deceived taken away part of what we have to do is recognize that our culture is saying all the wrong things in so many ways with regard to morality with regard to what it means to to truly live to be successful with in so many ways we're getting these messages and and we've got the technology that the message becomes ubiquitous wherever you turn it sits there and our children have it in their hands the palms of their hands and that part of what we have to do is also be diligent and understanding of what the gospel really is what Jesus teaches what the church from the beginning has taught and not to be deceived because that the world wants to tell us that certain things are are not sinful after all they're fine and a half of that kind of acceptance of certain people within the church weekend a great deal of what we're seeing now they've become confused too it's a loss of faith on the part of those some of the things you read about us that we're from Pennsylvania and other places st. Louis and how you have to ask yourself that if they really did have the faith how could they do that well you had written a book 15 years ago addressing the scandal and in the early 2002 was the name of the book er shaken by stricken collection of essays - yeah but here's and interestingly have many of the same people that wrote in your book are the ones that you read undone on the internet now and that might be interesting to reflect on what we were saying back 15 years ago back here today have we improved anything was the things cleaned up is this the same issue but also I seem to remember you've been rat singer back then during that time saying that it's a problem with the issue of faith right it's yes it's do you believe that what the church has taught all along about certain moral issues do you believe that's true do you believe that if you're a priest that you are spiritual father if you're a bishop that you're a spiritual father he believed our Lord Jesus Christ when he says better that you have a millstone hung around your neck can be thrown in the depths of the sea then for you to cause one of these little ones to stumble do you believe that or not and if you do believe it how could you do these things well you were an of the same Protestant tradition I was I was of more of the one saved always saved group and the problem with that though I don't think any of those leaders would have promoted this idea but one of the sad things out of that movement is if if it really doesn't matter how I live there's a security there you know presume presumption that when I stand if I died two nine stood before God and he should ask me why I should let me into his kingdom I'll just point to Jesus and I accepted him as my Lord and Savior and so therefore I'm covered with his righteousness and God doesn't see my filth but that could lead to at least undercutting a real motive for cleaning up one's life is there a similar presumption in Catholicism that could lead people to think in the end it really doesn't matter how I lived my life I'm wondering you know I try to understand how certain people could look themselves in the mirror but do they have a presumption about who they are or what they've accomplished or maybe how many sacraments they've received that somehow gives them the impression that you know it's not going to matter well I think in certain Catholic circles there have been there's been I had focus on mercy to the exclusion of justice that's one one symptom of that is to go to a Catholic funeral and to hear the eulogy and they're in talking is that always in heaven now and all that and no thought of praying for him because he might have to be purchasing I mean that's just one little example of it of people taking the attitude that oh it's all over with now there's there's nothing to be fixed or cleaned up he's going straight to heaven which of course is not with the church the stuff is not the reality only in certain cases that someone would and so uh seems to me an emphasis on mercy without also talking about justice you get other versions of it people say well I went to confession so have to worry about that now when actually this is cut to be a attempt to reform your life it's a part of that whole sacrament confession isn't really just the words that come out and the words that come from the priests is what's going on your heart right and you can you can dispose yourself in such a way that you're basically spurning the grace that comes to you through the sacrament I mean up careful how I say that but it's so much that it's kind of any it's what Dietrich Bonhoeffer Oh what are separate your brother another theologian what's called chief Jerry yeah this notion that and and some Catholics have it as well and the book that I did on set in hell my visit to hell the the quote I have on the you know the page in the beginning is hell is the final guarantee that what we do matters that was the final guarantee that what we do matters and some of the things I've been reading lately as folks I say do they have have they lost their faith their their faith that he'll exists that there's anything that they do really matters anything did they not believe in judgment and I mean I've got things to repent of in my life of course we all do so I'm not trying to be self-righteous about it but sooner or later you have to wonder how much this is contributes to the problem of people who don't have faith they don't have faith that God is God of justice as well as mercy they don't have faith that there is a Judgment Day they don't have faith you know I remember a and we need to be careful here we're not it's not like we got a bucket here full storms like we got like the throne nor like Jesus but I do remember when I was studying the English Puritans that there was a writer by the name of Richard Baxter who was a you know and he wrote a book called the reformed pastor which was written in 1650 and I think was 1650 and for a longest time during the 19th century it was required reading for every released Protestant Anglican seminarian because he said in 1650 so the Anglican Church had been around for a hundred years he said in there it's a sin when a man becomes a pastor before he's a Christian and you know again we're not pointing fingers and cussing stones but I mean the reality is we need to pray for our leaders who've who've as Paul says in first Timothy 3 desired to be a bishop desired to be priests and through the work of God's grace they were given the mantle and have accepted responsibility onto themselves to be witnesses of Christ and we need to pray desperately for them because they will stand before God with great accountability right for what they've accepted for their responsibility again we're not pointing fingers because if we're if you and I are Christians we done the same we've done the same we've accepted the name of Christ to be his witness and so you know what kind of witnesses are I was reminded of another scripture here that I wanted you to reflect on in course has been a development about the scripture because Jesus one time talked about there being a very wide door and a very narrow door and he talked about the majority of people are gonna go through the wide door but you know there's a narrow a very narrow door but there's been a development in that because over the years theologically we've widened that narrow door a lot haven't we so that there's just a whole lot more that little narrow door is it narrow anymore it's really really wide I'll talk about that have we widened that door you what I mean in in as Paul warned against in Romans 12 that we aren't to surrender to culture or to transformed by the renewal of cries you know have we not officially but has that door been widened at least in the eyes there's so many yeah I certainly think so and I wouldn't call it a development necessarily yeah it's it may be a contradiction in some ways what's gone before we Church teaches and I'm happy to to agree that that in the case of any individual we don't we don't know you know we pray for them even after the deceased and leave them in God's hands but the I think the part we have to focus on there is the first part of the statement now the second part is about you know if you enter or Minnie enter the first part of the statement is narrow is the way that leads and so we have to look at our own hearts and say okay am I taking the narrow way that means that it there'll be a lot of things that are ruled out for me there'll be a lot of things that I can't do and that sounds negative but in the end it's not negative because what lies on the other side Dory's glory yeah so you had mentioned earlier that one of the warnings of the end and again where we are to live our lives as if we could face our Lord tonight but one of the warnings at the end is that there would be great deception amongst the people amongst the faithful amongst the remnant would be tempted how do we make sure that our children and ourselves if we want to be a faithful remnant how do we protect ourselves from being deceived how do we make sure that we are are doing what we need to by grace to enter that narrow gate and that we haven't been deceived into thinking that gate is very very very wide there was a historical theologian and a churchy story and this will sound like an obvious answer for me but I see us Lewis you know great Christian writer once said that for every contemporary book he read he would read two books by from a previous generation and and for those of us who can and the access he got it on the Internet to to spend time reading what the church has always taught things from previous generations our generation has all kinds of blind spots and because we live in it we're not likely to see those blind spots when we're but to be deep in Scripture but also to you know gosh take a look at the Baltimore Catechism ya know go look at some of the the great works and they're the fathers like Cardinal Gibbons yeah awesome book to see what what is permanent and what is the kind of fluff that's being offered now sometimes of things that are said in very vague ways that could be misunderstood sometimes you wonder if you know someone's saying in order to deceive to to find your way to those sources that are perennial that have always been have been there a long time as to the test of time and to teach children to do the same yeah yeah and I I know that that even a part of this confusing time for many people is our our Holy Fathers challenging of a statement in the Catechism you know and that's a bit debated but other than less that issue I still feel very confident that the Catechism is a great source of if you want to know how not to be deceived you file you read the Catechism you read the Catechism to hear what because the Catechism pulls in from Scripture and pulls and freely research fathers puts it into a wonderful way to understand this is this is the deposit of faith this is how we understand what what the church is minute to go and it's not a lot of time Paul you also again wrote about being a being careful as spiritual the spiritual battle you've got a wonderful book on spiritual warfare just couple seconds how about helping the people know what to do to make sure not only being deceived by bad teachers but that they're listening to the Holy Spirit in the book I'll just say there's sections about what our armor is and Saint Paul talks of our spiritual armor what are our weapons and so we hold fast at Scripture it's a prayer to the sacraments sacramentals we've been given fasting all the traditional spiritual disciplines and means of grace that we know we have not to neglect them and then the armor actually is the virtues that have we developed the virtues than those fiery darts that come from the enemy that Saint Paul talks about they'll hit the armor and fall down the enemy tempts us to pride and we've developed humility it's not quite Texas for example so those are you can look at the book for more details but all the classic spiritual disciplines that the churches give Paul thank you so much god bless you know all your viewers okay thank you very much thank you for joining us on this episode of the journey god bless you [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music]

Channel: EWTN

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Id: -XO8JzE0qCc

Length: 56min 11sec (3371 seconds)

Published: Mon Oct 01 2018